Tim Blake Nelson
| birth_date = | birth_place = Tulsa, Oklahoma, U.S. | education = Brown University Juilliard School | occupation = Actor, writer, director | years_active = 1989–present | spouse = | children = 3 }} Timothy Blake Nelson is an American actor, writer and director. His most famous roles include Mole Man in Fantastic Four (2015), Delmar O'Donnell in O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), Dr. Pendanski in Holes (2003), Daniel "Danny" Dalton Jr. in Syriana (2005), Dr. Samuel Sterns in The Incredible Hulk (2008), Richard Schell in Lincoln (2012), and Buster Scruggs in The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018). Early life Nelson was born to a Jewish family in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the son of Ruth (née Kaiser) Nelson,Michael Smith, "Bloomer Sooner: Tulsa native Tim Blake Nelson's roots are showing", Tulsa World, May 6, 2009. who is a noted social activist and philanthropist in Tulsa, and Don Nelson, a geologist/wildcatter.Tulsa Historical Society, 1999 Hall of Fame Inductee: Ruth K. Nelson , tulsahistory.org; accessed June 14, 2017. His maternal uncle is businessman George Kaiser. His maternal grandparents, who were from Germany, escaped the Nazis shortly before World War II, moving to Britain in 1938, where Nelson's mother was born,Stated on WTF with Marc Maron, December 3, 2018 and immigrating to the United States in 1941. His father's family were Russian Jewish emigrants. Nelson attended the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute at Quartz Mountain Resort Arts and Conference Center in Lone Wolf, Oklahoma.Oklahoma Arts Institute, Alumni Listing Nelson is a 1982 graduate of Holland Hall School in Tulsa, and a graduate of Brown University, where he was a Classics major as well as Senior Orator for his class of 1986. At Brown, he studied under the philosopher Martha Nussbaum. He is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society. Nelson won the Workman/Driskoll award for excellence in Classical Studies.Kari Molvar, "Q&A: Tim Blake Nelson", Brown Alumni Magazine (March/April 2001). He graduated from Juilliard in 1990, a member of Group 19.http://www.juilliard.edu/alumni/reflections_0603.html Career Nelson's debut play, Eye of God, was produced at Seattle Repertory Theatre in 1992. The Grey Zone premiered at MCC Theater in New York in 1996, where his 1998 work Anadarko was produced. He was a co-star of the sketch comedy show The Unnaturals, which ran on HA! (later CTV, and would turn into Comedy Central) between 1989 and 1991, alongside Paul Zaloom, John Mariano and Siobhan Fallon Hogan. Nelson has appeared as an actor in film, TV and theatre. He had a featured role as Delmar in the film O Brother, Where Art Thou? According to directors Joel and Ethan Coen, he was the only one in the cast or crew who had read Homer's Odyssey, a story upon which the film is loosely based.Romney, Jonathan. "The Coen brothers: Double vision", The Guardian, May 19, 2000. He sang "In the Jailhouse Now" on the film's soundtrack (which received a Grammy for Album of the Year in 2001). Nelson has gone on to act in a number of supporting performances in films such as Minority Report, Syriana and Lincoln. He also appeared in Marvel Comics adaptations The Incredible Hulk and Fantastic Four. Nelson narrated the 2001 audiobook At the Altar of Speed: The Fast Life and Tragic Death of Dale Earnhardt, Sr. He appeared on stage extensively off-Broadway in New York at theatres including Manhattan Theater Club, Playwrights Horizons, Manhattan Class Company, Soho Repertory Theater, New York Theater Workshop, and Central Park's Open Air Theater in the Shakespeare plays Richard III, Troilus and Cressida, and A Midsummer Night's Dream. He has directed film versions of his plays The Grey Zone and Eye of God (for which he received an Independent Spirit Awards nomination for the Someone to Watch Award), as well as writing and directing two original screenplays: 1998's Kansas and Leaves of Grass, which was released in 2009. He directed the film ''O'', based on Othello and set in a modern-day high school. For Eye of God, he received the Tokyo Bronze Prize at the Tokyo International Film Festival (1997) and the American Independent Award at the Seattle International Film Festival (1997); for O'', the Best Director Award at the Seattle International Film Festival (2001); and for ''The Grey Zone, the National Board of Review's Freedom of Expression Award (2002). He is on the Board of Directors for The Actors Center in New York City, as well as Soho Rep Theatre. Nelson guest-starred on the CSI: Crime Scene Investigation season 10 episode "Working Stiffs". In the episode "My Brother's Bomber" (aired September 29, 2015) of the PBS investigative series Frontline, he talked about the loss of his friend David Dornstein in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. In 2018, Nelson played Buster Scruggs in The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, a western anthology film by Joel and Ethan Coen. Nelson had received the original script sixteen years prior in 2002. The film was released on Netflix on November 16, after a limited theatrical run, and received positive reviews from critics, with many highlighting Nelson's performance and his overall segment. Playwright Nelson's play, Socrates opened at The Public Theater in 2019, starring Michael Stuhlbarg. It was favorably received by numerous publications, including the New York TImes. Personal life Nelson resides in New York City with his wife, Lisa Benavides, and their three sons. On May 8, 2009, he was inducted as an honorary member of the University of Tulsa's Beta of Oklahoma chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa national collegiate honor society.http://orgs.utulsa.edu/spcol/?p=4805 Filmography Film Television References External links * * Category:American people of Jewish descent Category:20th-century American dramatists and playwrights Category:American male film actors Category:Film directors from New York City Category:American male screenwriters Category:American male stage actors Category:American male television actors Category:American male voice actors Category:American people of German-Jewish descent Category:American people of Russian-Jewish descent Category:Brown University alumni Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Jewish American male actors Category:Juilliard School alumni Category:Living people Category:Male actors from Tulsa, Oklahoma Category:American male Shakespearean actors Category:Jewish American dramatists and playwrights Category:20th-century American male actors Category:21st-century American male actors Category:Writers from Tulsa, Oklahoma Category:American male dramatists and playwrights Category:Screenwriters from New York (state) Category:Year of birth missing (living people)